1. Field
The present general inventive concept generally relates to a halftone screen producing apparatus, a print controlling apparatus, an image forming apparatus, a method of producing a halftone screen, a method of controlling printing, a method of forming an image, and a computer-readable recording medium.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, an image forming apparatus refers to an apparatus that prints print data generated in a terminal apparatus, such as a computer, on recording paper. Examples of such an image forming apparatus include copiers, printers, facsimile machines, and multifunction peripherals (MFP), which combine the aforementioned devices in a single device.
Such apparatuses have a limited capability to reproduce tones and use halftoning to represent a high number of tones. Halftoning is a method that converts an original image having a high value or level of detail per one pixel into an image having a low value or level of detail per one pixel, and generally creates an image having two tones.
In order to perform halftoning, the image forming apparatus uses a screen with a limited size. The screen is formed in a grid pattern, having squares with horizontally and vertically limited sizes, and one integer value is assigned to each square. In performing the halftoning, one square on the screen corresponds to one pixel of the original image. For example, if halftoning is to be performed with respect to an image of 10 m*10 n using a screen of m*n, the halftoning is performed by tiling the screen 10*10 times, vertically and horizontally.
Quality of the halftoned image may be affected by the screen. Depending on the screen, a degree of softness of the image or a size of a pattern may be different and a resultant printed image may be good or not. Accordingly, it is important to manufacture a screen capable of improving the quality of an image.
A related art method uses an ordered screen in which dots have a uniform gap therebetween. However, the ordered screen has a specific angle and a specific frequency and, as a result, incurs an interference pattern, such as moiré, when color printing.
In order to solve this problem, a method using a stochastic screen has been suggested. However, a related art stochastic screen is normally used at high resolution of 1200 dpi or more, but may deteriorate image quality at low resolution.